Brotherly Bond
by lindseygirl
Summary: Once he's back to his childhood home, Sirius receive some desvastating news.


Regulus.  
  
His brother, was dead.  
  
He sat in the dark room that had once been his in Grimmauld Place, his hands covering his face. He had just found out and, though it had been years, over a decade, ago, though he hadn't spoken to his brother since he was sixteen – maybe because of it – it still had hit him forcefully.  
  
He hadn't always hated Regulus – they were brothers and, even in the Black household, where innocence was a despised, rare gift, they had been innocent once.  
  
They had been kids, before the blinding hate against his family that last all trough his teens and some later, and they had been brothers and they had loved each other as such.  
  
After all, what did a kid know, even in the circle he was raised in, about the mischief of life and prejudice – what did a child care about what happened to muggleborns, to half-bloods and werewolves, things so alien his world as poverty was to a rich kid?  
  
He remembered, very well, that the only thing they had in common, besides their kinship, had been their abnormally tall heights. Other than that, Regulus had always been the sheer antithesis of Sirius, but that did not pose as a problem at any time during the last of their childhood, not for years to come.  
  
There were two main traits of magically powerful, inhuman blood in the Black genealogy – Sirius had, it was unquestionable, took after the Veela side.  
  
It was obvious in his allure, as some would come to call it – the ability he had of making people do things they didn't necessarily want to, his ease of escaping punishment for his misdeeds. It was there in the fair skin he had possessed most of his childhood, though later tanned by the continuous exposure to the sun. It was there in his angular, beautiful features, almost androgen ones.  
  
It was there in his eyes, those thoroughly exotic eyes, called by some of eyes of the sees, because of their colour varying from clear blue to dark grey with the slight mood change, as the ocean varied with the tempest.  
  
It was very visible in his unstable temper and in his over-energetic self – he could still fell the scent of the woods near their country house in Germany, where he'd go and just run without destiny until sun felt.  
  
The only trait, in fact, which he didn't possessed from his ancestors was the almost white hair, since his was as dark as ebony – but he knew, as all Black did, that it was due to his being generated in a night the moon was out of the sky. He couldn't tell why or how – no one could – but since immemorial times his family had had a strong association to the moon. He could even tell, without a chart or calendar, when the moon changed, it's phases affecting his whole self, from his mind to his strength.  
  
It affected all of them, the Black's, even the mild Regulus, though in a different level, which he had never been able to fully comprehend.  
  
He sighed as he remembered his brother. He had always been very mild, though he wasn't sure that was the word to describe his brother's serenity and apparent detachment from the realm of matter.  
  
One could tell him the weather was bad and later that his house had been burned down and he'd react in the same manner – he'd just take the information in, to be carefully evaluated, before acting on it - if he'd even act, that is.  
  
He was, some could say, a bookworm, thought that wouldn't be enough to explain his love of books. One could always find Regulus in a library; all they had to do was look.  
  
It was always the same image that came to his mind, when he thought of Regulus – a lean, maybe too thin, white blond, as he had been made in a night the moon was full in the sky and werewolves howled, boy sitting in a green velvet armchair, a book in his lap. His eyes would slowly move, line trough line, drinking of the fountain of knowledge he considered books.  
  
He remembered his eyes very well – they to weren't human ones, but neither were they eyes of storm.  
  
They were the extremely pale, almost transparent, ones of a vampire. For Regulus had taken after their great-grandfather, a vampire that, trough more dark magic than he was willing to think about, had managed to produce an heir, though a not completely human one.  
  
He supposed, now, that that was the reason for his brother always looking a bit odd – misplaced, wherever he was, with his long refulgent white hair, extremely pale pallor, more than Sirius had ever been, and his unnatural aura.  
  
He had several traits of his demoniac inheritance – a visible distaste for any light stronger than a low fire's. Light was not physically harmful for him, of course, but without it he could see as well as a cat. He also had a considerably improved hearing, which proved useful when they wanted to spy on the grown-ups meeting – but his sense of taste was extremely deprived. Sirius had always been convinced he could sneak in chopped cardboard in his brother's meal without the other noticing.  
  
Sirius once more sighed, in the dark, slightly dingy room, his hand to his face.  
  
There hadn't been problems between him and his brother until his third year – unlike their parents, who sent him a howler, Regulus had made no comment on his making Gryffindor instead of Slytherin.  
  
He could remember very well of that day, in the train – Regulus was going to Hogwarts for the first time, and he had just introduced him to his friends.  
  
The light-hared boy had made no remark as he shook hands with the three older boys – not until Remus left for the bathroom.  
  
"You never told me you had befriended a werewolf." He commented, in his soft, calm voice, as if commenting on the weather.  
  
"What are you talking about?" he had asked, quite startled.  
  
"Your friend" he had replied, just as calmly, as James and Peter stared in confusion at him "He's a werewolf. Didn't you know?" Sirius shook his head and Regulus shrugged, before Remus re-entered the cabin. No one said anything about it to Remus, or to each other, during the whole trip. Regulus'd left shortly after Remus had returned, with the excuse of searching for some first-years, who he was ought to meet, but, as the train stopped, hours later, Sirius still had in mind what his brother had said.  
  
He knew, very well, that his brother had a certain sense for Dark Magic – he had saved his live once, stopping Sirius from opening a cursed book in the Black manor library – but, still, he couldn't believe it.  
  
He had known Remus for two years now – they were very close friends. He refused to believe he had been keeping such secret from him.  
  
But Regulus had never been mistaken about such things.  
  
He decided, at last, to confront Regulus, after the welcoming feast, about it.  
  
The Sorting began and Regulus was the third student to be called out after the Sorting Hat's Song. Sirius fingers were crossed under the table, though his faced feigned indifference.  
  
And then it happened. Minutes – moment – hours – he had no way to tell – after he had placed the hat upon his head, it called, loud and clear; Slytherin.  
  
His world felt – he knew it was a long shot, since he had been the only one in the past century, but he had expected his brother to come to Gryffindor with him.  
  
He tried to call for his attention, but it was in vain – the part vampire strolled across the hall towards the Slytherin table and sat there, without as much as looking to the sides once.  
  
He did not manage to get a hold of him even after the feast – he had already headed to the dungeons where he knew the Slytherin Common Room was.  
  
The nest day, he looked for his brother avidly – he had noticed an ill air about Remus, right before realising that the Full had been only two days previous.  
  
When he spotted him, however, anger rose up.  
  
Side by side with Regulus was Snape, glancing over at Sirius with a malicious smirk on, before nudging the eleven-year-old towards a seat by his side in the Slytherin table, near Lucius Malfoy.  
  
He only managed to get a hold of Regulus after breakfast and, when he did, Remus was no longer the worry in his mind.  
  
"What were you doing with Snape and Malfoy?" Sirius had demanded, his arms folded over his chest.  
  
"They're my house mates, Sirius." He calmly retorted, matter-of-factly.  
  
"Surely you can do better than them!" He exclaimed, frowning.  
  
"But Mother and Father told me to make relations with them." He replied, as even as ever, causing Sirius to stare wide-eyed at him.  
  
"Why do you do all they tell you to?" he asked, slightly disgusted.  
  
"Because they are my parents." Was his simple, calm answer, before turning away and heading towards where the other Slytherins, all older than him, stood.  
  
It was the last time he truly spoke to Regulus – it was about then he started to hate him, as well as his brother, undoubtfully instigated by the Slytherins, began to hate him.  
  
But, even as he grew older and his hate grew stronger, there was something he never forgot. It was just a simple sentence, if heard by others, but it marked him forever – "Because the are my parents".  
  
As if that made them into holders of absolute truth – as if he had to do everything, no matter what, they said.  
  
Which he did.  
  
They had been apart, with no contact, for four years when he heard that Regulus had turned into a Death Eater.  
  
It was that day he decided to take the oath for the Order.  
  
He remembered what Remus had told him about Regulus' death – it had been a few days before Lilly and James's.  
  
Regulus had decided to leave Voldemort – maybe he had a touch of the Sight and had seen what was to happen; there where Seers' blood in the family lines, after all.  
  
Maybe he just wanted out of it – maybe he had realised what he had got himself into.  
  
Sirius had no way of knowing.  
  
He did know, however, that they had caught him returning from a meeting with a Ministry officer – what they had done to him, he did not want to think about.  
  
All he needed to know was that Belatrix – their own cousin – had been the one to kill him.  
  
She was now in jail, he knew – he had heard her coming in, calling out to him, and mocking him.  
  
He only hoped, as tears finally managed to make they way down his beaten face, that she got what she truly deserved some day.  
  



End file.
